Note 47 — SENTENCES.
Reading edition
On which place says Dr. Bentley, “The Context demands that it be,⸺Him descending, Illo descendente.” But him is not the Ablative Case, for the English knows no such Case; nor does him without a Preposition on any occasion answer to the Latin Ablative illo. I might with better reason contend, that it ought to be “his descending,” because it is in Greek αυτου καταβαινοντος in the Genitive; and it would be as good Grammar, and as proper English. This comes of forcing the English under the rules of a foreign Language, with which it has little concern: and this ugly and deformed fault, to use his own expression, Bentley has endeavoured to impose upon Milton in several places: see P. L. vii. 15. ix. 829, 883, 1147. x. 267, 1001. On the other hand, where Milton has been really guilty of this fault, he, very inconsistently with himself, corrects him, and sets him right. His Latin Grammar Rules were happily out of his head, and by a kind of vernacular instinct (so, I imagine, he would call it) he perceived that his Author was wrong.
“For only in destroying I find ease To my relentless thoughts; and, him destroy’d, Or won to what may work his utter loss, For whom all this was made, all this will soon Follow, as to him link’d in weal or woe.” P. L. ix. 129.
It ought to be, “he destroy’d,” that is, “he being destroy’d.” Bentley corrects it, “and man destroy’d.”
Archbishop Tillotson has fallen into the same mistake: “Solomon was of this mind; and I make no doubt, but he made as wise and true Proverbs as any body has done since: Him only excepted, who was a much greater and wiser man than Solomon.” Vol. I. Ser. 53.